Date of Award
5-10-2017
Degree Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
English
First Advisor
Dr. Lynee Gaillet
Second Advisor
Dr. Ashley Holmes
Third Advisor
Dr. Malinda Snow
Abstract
Scotland in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries produced some of the most renowned thinkers and scholars whose works are still widely read and admired. This cadre of enlightened philosophers established a framework for critical thinking and reasoning, as well as a foundation for composition studies. One of the literary geniuses whose work drew on this expertise was Arthur Conan Doyle, best known for giving the world Sherlock Holmes in the late 1880s. But Doyle’s contributions are more than mere stories; the Edinburgh native endowed his character with the philosophy he himself gleaned growing up in a culture that prized reasoning, critical thinking, elocution, and elegant composition. This dissertation explores the influences Doyle drew from the great minds of the Scottish Enlightenment and connects them to the character of Sherlock Holmes. In addition, it proposes that Holmes’s philosophy establishes a basis for composition classes, where students are introduced to the concepts of critical thinking, reasoning, and logic, and the key role these concepts play in argumentative writing.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.57709/10122968
Recommended Citation
Cauley, Helen, "Influences of the Scottish Enlightenment in the Sherlock Holmes Stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2017.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/10122968